Douglas County-based EchoStar Communications Corp. is the leading investor in a $20.3 million round of funding for CinemaNow Inc., a film and television download service.
CinemaNow chief executive Curt Marvis said Thursday that the Marina Del Rey, Calif.- based company received the funding from six investors, including Japan’s Index Holdings and Cisco Systems Inc. CinemaNow has received more than $40 million in venture backing since it started in 1999.
The money will help Cinema Now offer more content, increase its marketing and offer service over wireless devices, Marvis said. Studios including Walt Disney Co. and Time Warner Inc.’s Warner Bros. are letting consumers download and own content from the Internet for viewing on personal computers through Cinema Now and rival Movielink LLC.
“This will accelerate our development,” Marvis said.
Menlo Ventures, Lions Gate Entertainment Corp. and Transcosmos Inc. also contributed to the new round of financing.
Marvis declined to say how much each company provided.
The investment comes only a few months after EchoStar led a $46.6 million investing round in Sling Media Inc., maker of a device that allows people to watch their home televisions anywhere a high-speed Internet connection is available.
Douglas County-based Liberty Media also is an investor in Sling Media.
Viacom Inc.’s Paramount Pictures will begin offering films on CinemaNow within the next two months, Marvis said. Index Holdings, based in Tokyo, is a mobile-phone-content provider.
EchoStar is the second-largest U.S. satellite-TV provider, behind DirecTV Group Inc.
Cisco, based in San Jose, Calif., is the world’s biggest maker of computer-networking equipment.
Denver Post staff writer Kimberly S. Johnson contributed to this report.
